


Midsummer

by LilyMaid



Series: Endless Always [1]
Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: F/M, Prompts in Panem, dreameverlark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-31
Updated: 2015-03-31
Packaged: 2018-03-20 14:43:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3654237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LilyMaid/pseuds/LilyMaid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Every summer District 12 celebrates Midsummer, and this year Katniss is excited to go</p>
            </blockquote>





	Midsummer

Every year, following the completion of the Games, and after school had let out for the summer, the residents of District 12 prepare for Midsummer, a local holiday. Many young couples marry either just before or on the day of celebration.

 

There is some dispute in local lore whether the origin of the holiday was to celebrate the many nuptials of their poor community all at one time, or if the young, who’d just aged out of Reaping, wed at a time when nearly all were most thankful, with food and fiddles and dancing to add to their joy.

 

Booths and tables are set up like market day in the square. Paper lanterns, once white, and faded old bunting, are removed from some dusty corner of the Justice building. They’re hung above and around the square, giving it a welcomed festive appearance.

 

Shopkeepers and tradesmen sell unusual treats such as salted popped corn tucked into paper cones, small goat meat pies, glass beaded bracelets, or paper flowers. Tables groan with food each family brings to share. Dried fruit or some pickled vegetable are common, there are casseroles, pots of broth or stew, platters of sliced cucumbers and tomatoes, baskets of rolls, golden and yeasty, others flat and dark. There is more during a good year, and much less in a bad one.

 

This year Katniss Everdeen was feeling particularly grateful. It had been Prim’s first Reaping and both had made it through unscathed. Neither had known the two kids that had left for the Capitol, and so the Games hadn’t been any more horrible than usual.

 

Katniss had worked out a deal with the town butcher, if she and Gale, her best friend and hunting partner, supplied the meat then Ruba would roast it. After tracking for several days they’d managed to take down a large buck, and two days later a wild pig, bringing them to Ruba after dark, to avoid a commotion. Katniss was glad they’d been able to spend this time together, since he would start working in the mines that next Monday.

 

On Midsummer’s day Katniss returns from the woods outside the fence early, to prepare for the several toastings her family will attend. As she sits in the washtub, scrubbing the grit from under her nails, she eagerly thinks of all the small children from the Seam who have rarely had fresh meat, eating the pork, chins slick with grease.

 

Her fingers are pruning when she finally dries off, having had to wait for her mother to bring more water so she could rinse her hair.

 

Mrs. Everdeen walks into the room, a pale green dress draped over her arm. She combs out Katniss’s wet hair, braiding and then pinning it up.

 

“I thought the green would look lovely with your complexion,” says Mrs. Everdeen, a little shyly. “Bring out your eyes.”

 

Katniss is touched that her mother had given any thought to her at all and gives her a small smile. It is still a bit hard for her to accept these types of gestures. Mrs. Everdeens’ negligence after Mr. Everdeens’ death nearly five years before had hurt Katniss nearly as much as losing her father. But she’s been trying, for Prim, to be kind.

 

A young woman stares at her through the cracked mirror sullenly, her expression the only feature seeming familiar. Katniss's body seems small and unwomanly in her trousers and buttoned shirts. The soft clinging fabric of the dress, however, enhances her gentle curves. The low neckline displays her clavicle, the hollow of her throat, and long graceful lines of her neck. The sash ties in front, and gives her the appearance of hips. While buttoning the straps of her mother’s flat slippers she wonders what Gale might think of the dress, if he’ll laugh at her, like he had the summer before.

 

“Oh Katniss,” Prim says, rushing into the room breathlessly. “You look so beautiful!”

 

“You look so beautiful, little Duck!” says Katniss, with a wide smile. “Where have you been?”

 

“I was bringing Lady back from the Meadow,” says Prim. “And picking the last of the wild flowers, for the brides.” She kneels on the floor beside their bed and retrieves several hair ribbons from her basket of treasures.

 

“Here, help me, please?” say Prim, handing a ribbon to Katniss.

 

“With what?” says Katniss. “You’re already wearing ribbons.”

 

“They’re for the flowers,” says Prim, over her shoulder as she bounces through the door.

 

Together they bunched the foxgloves, daisies, indian paintbrushes, jacobs ladders, and black eyed susans into bouquets and bound them with pale pink and blue ribbons.

 

Prim revels in the couples obvious joy, clasping and unclasping her hands, sighing the entire time. Katniss prefers regular toastings to the rushed variant that occurs this time of year, the ceremonies she attends that day seemed almost impersonal in their repetition. Mrs. Everdeen was the personification of propriety, though her concentration seems to slip while the vows are pledged.

 

Before walking to town Katniss and Mrs. Everdeen wait by the gate while Prim retrieves three carefully wrapped cheeses and a tin cup from the kitchen, the late afternoon sun still high.

 

Surrounded by their neighbors they walk with arms linked, making their way carefully along the road, trying not to disturb the settled coal dust.

 

Along the way they meet Gale and the other Hawthorn kids, Rory and Vic, his two younger brothers, and Posy, the baby of the family, perched on Gale’s shoulders clutching her cup. Prim smiles broadly at Rory, who smiles back, shyly. Mrs. Hawthorn and Mrs. Everdeen chat about the different toastings they attended. Katniss and Gale walked behind, silently. All of the Hawthorns seem to be wearing their Reaping clothes, except for Posey, who is wearing one of Prim’s old dresses.

 

Gale glances at her enough times that she grows uncomfortable, and refuses to return his looks. She itches to rush ahead, to escape his stare and this herd of people that now seem too close. Stepping ahead she grasps Prims free hand and they swing their linked arms, grinning at each other.

 

The scent of roasting meat greets them even before they’ve reached the outskirts of the businesses. Katniss’s excitement returns, and though only moments before she’d been wishing she was far away dressed in her own clothes, she finds that she’s almost as eager as Prim.

 

At the square Prim leaves her cheese at one of the less full tables. As the sun descends behind the western peaks they eat their small share of the feast. Katniss glances around, taking more sustenance from the delight of others than the food she chews.

 

As soon as the last crumb is sucked off her fingertips, Prim drags Katniss toward the music and dancing. Gale veers toward his school friends, grumbling, “I don’t dance.”

 

The musicians play beside the dancers, two fiddlers, a man with a banjo, a woman with a mandolin, and a flutist. Katniss and Prim take their place in line facing each other, clapping. Winter evenings had given them plenty of time to practice, so they were quite good partners. They twirl and spin, laughing.

 

When they switch partners Katniss is surprised to find herself paired with Peeta Mellark. Somehow he seems taller than the last time she’d seen him, just a few weeks before on the last day of school. The faded blue button shirt, probably a hand-me-down from one of his brothers, makes his eyes seem bluer, if that were possible.

 

He smiles down at her, hand clasped over hers, the other firmly on her waist. When did he begin looking so manly? Just as she begins to compose herself they spin away from each other and she’s with someone else.

 

Again and again she’s startled when she twirls into Peeta’s arms, looks up into his face, and each time he smiles, as if to reassure her.

 

He’s still holding her when one reel ends, and the next song starts slow, a waltz for the older crowd. Most of the kids scamper away to see what food is left, or to find their cup to get a drink from the water pump. As Katniss pulls away Peeta catches her hand.

 

“Where are you going?” says Peeta. “Stay and dance a whole one with me.”

 

Trying to muster an excuse to get away, Katniss finds her mind blank.

 

"Okay," she says.

 

She steps back toward Peeta and settles a hand on his shoulder. They dance well together, and she enjoys being led, rather than having to lead Prim. She catches herself glancing up at his face several times, only to see his own eyes trained on hers. As the strains of melody tremulously fade into the deepening night Katniss steps away, firmly.

 

“I’m thirsty, and I need to check on Prim,” she says, making eye contact.

 

“She’s over by the bonfire with her friends,” Peeta says, pointing. “I’ll get you a drink and meet you over there.”

 

“You don’t have to do that, I can get my own,” Katniss says, annoyed, knowing that he'll insist.

 

“Oh, I don’t mind,” Peeta says, with a wide grin.

 

Katniss finds Prim with several girls, all of them giggling and talking faster than she could follow. Walking around the fire she finds an empty space on one of the logs set out as makeshift benches.

 

Just as she sits Peeta appears and plops down beside her, offering her his cup. Most of the cold water is gone before she realizes he might want some too, and gives the cup back. He takes the last swallow and sets the cup down.

 

Stretching his legs out in front of him and crossing his feet he begins to talk. He tells her stories about growing up the youngest of three brothers, bakery antics, and grins proudly every time he catches Katniss smiling. She tells him some of her more colorful hunting incidents, and some sweet stories about Prim, after Peeta asks. She starts to tell him a story about her favorite constellation, but finds the square is too illuminated to see much more than the Summer Triangle.

 

“Come on!” she says, jumping up, tugging on Peeta’s hand to get him to follow her.

 

He doesn’t let go of her hand the entire trek to the Meadow. The road is unfamiliar in the dark, and they often stumble. In the center of the Meadow Katniss flops down and waves to the empty space beside her. And then she tells him stories her father had taught her about the stars, her face and voice animated, her hands gesture above them in the air.

 

Peeta looks at her expectantly, and an idea comes to mind what he must want.

 

Pausing, she clears her throat. “Thank you, Peeta. For the bread, for giving me the bread.”

 

Raising his head off the grass he peers at her. “The bread, from when we were kids? That was nothing, I just wish I could have done more.”

 

Katniss feels her face flush ands sits up, pulling her knees to her chest.

 

“It wasn’t nothing,” she says. “It was everything! It saved my life, my sister’s life! And you could have gotten in so much trouble if your mother found out! Why did you do it?”

 

Peeta opens and closes his mouth, presses his lips together, rakes the curls off his forehead, and then lets his head fall to the ground. He slowly lets out a deep breath.

 

"We were five the first time I ever saw you,” he says. “My father walked me to school on the first day. He pointed at little girl in a red plaid dress, hair in two braids, instead of one. He said 'See that little girl? I wanted to marry her mother, but she ran off with a coal miner.'"

 

Katniss stares in shock.

 

"And I asked why'd she want a coal miner when she could have had him," says Peeta. "He said, 'Because when he sings... even the birds stop to listen.'"

 

"They do!" Katniss says. "I mean, they did." Katniss is surprisingly moved that the old baker had told this to Peeta.

 

“So that day, in music assembly, the teacher asked who knew the valley song," says Peeta. "Your hand shot right up in the air. She stood you up on a stool and had you sing it for us. And I swear, every bird outside the windows fell silent."

 

"No, that didn't happen, did it?" says Katniss.

 

"It did," says Peeta, insistently. "And right when your song ended, I knew, just like your mother, I was a goner."

 

Katniss lets out the breath she'd been holding, warmth bubbling in her chest.

 

"You've always been lovely, even then, always singing and laughing, dancing everywhere you went," says Peeta. "I thought your eyes must have been made from stars. And after... the mining accident, I saw you fading away. Till you were practically translucent and the light had left your eyes. I was so afraid for you."

 

The warmth spreads out from her chest, soaking into her bones and she feels that she must be glowing.

 

"It was more than anyone else did, Peeta," says Katniss, softly. "You saved us that day." All this time Katniss has been feeling she owes Peeta, while he's only felt regret at not doing more.

 

"Me? No, you saved you."

 

"Peeta..."

 

"You're so strong and-"

 

"Peeta! Stop-"

 

"And brave-"

 

Impulsively Katniss leans over and presses her lips to his, to stop more words from spilling out. Peeta inhales sharply through his nose. Embarrassed by her boldness she pulls back, unsure of what to do.

 

Peetas lips follow hers, his fingertips ghost over her cheek to the side of her head. His lips brush against hers lightly, as if testing their realness. A curious feeling stirs in her midsection, of wanting more kisses from this boy. Of wanting to learn him.

 

His kisses are sweet and unhurried; yet underneath seem fueled with immeasurable heat. It was as if before she were nothing but dry kindling, and now, surely, she must be so luminescent that the stars above could be nothing but dull imitations.

 

Peeta touches his forehead to Katniss’s, breathing in soft pants, before laying back into the grass, head pillowed upon his bent arm.

 

“Do you have anymore stories for me?” says Peeta.

 

Katniss shakes her head.

 

“None come to mind,” she says.

 

“Well, lets see if I’ve been a good student,” he says, and pulls her down beside him. Resting her head on his shoulder, the arm wraps under her her ribs, and his hand splays over her waist to gently hold her to him. The gesture is so comforting that her eyes and nose sting. She coughs to alleviate the burning of her throat.

 

He recites back some of the stories, sometimes pausing for confirmation if he’d pointed to the right place in the sky, or if he was unsure of what came next. After a time he pauses, with a sigh.

 

“Katniss, we’d better get back, you’re family will start to wonder where you've gone,” says Peeta.

 

Not wanting to worry her mother or Prim she bounces up, suddenly impatient to be away. When Peeta takes her hand again a cold shiver creeps up her spine. They make their way back, a quickly as they can, though to Katniss it seems to take much longer than usual.

 

At the edge of town Peeta pauses, stopping Katniss and pulling her back to him.

 

“I had a great time tonight, Katniss,” says Peeta with quiet enthusiasm. “Can we… can I see you again?”

 

“Yeah, I’ll see you on Sunday, when I come to trade,” Katniss says, looking down at the toes of Peeta’s worn boots. The creeping cold seems to squeeze her heart, making it hard to breath. He wraps a strong arm around her and rests his cheek atop her hair, her ear pressed to his chest.

 

As much as Katniss wants to find Prim, stepping away from Peeta’s warmth is almost physically painful. She gives him a half smile and they walk the rest of the way into town in silence, not touching.

 

 


End file.
